The country's 80th budget will be presented in Parliament on February 1, 2026! Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the budget for the ninth consecutive time.

The Union Budget will be presented in Parliament on February 1, 2026. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be presenting the Budget for the ninth time. This will be the 80th budget of independent India. Like every year, this time too, farmers, employed people, women, youth and the business class have great expectations from the budget. People want to know whether there will be tax relief or not and whether inflation will be controlled. Let us tell you that today the size of the budget is lakhs of crores, but do you know how much was the first budget in independent India? So let's know the full story of the first budget.
The budget is the annual financial plan of the government. It gives full details of the estimated income and expenditure of the government for the coming financial year. According to Article 112 of the Indian Constitution, the Union Budget is an annual financial document of the government. The budget is divided into two parts - the revenue budget (which includes day-to-day income and expenses) and the capital budget (which includes large investments, debt and infrastructure-related expenses). Very few people know that the first budget of India was presented not after independence, but during the British rule. On April 7, 1860, James Wilson, the finance minister of British India, presented the first budget. At that time, the purpose of the budget was not the welfare of the common people, but to meet the needs of the British rule. For the first time, income tax was announced in this budget.
India got independence on 15th August 1947. Three months later, on November 26, 1947, the first Union Budget of independent India was presented in Parliament. It was introduced by the country's first Finance Minister, Sir R. K. Shanmukham Chetty. This budget was not made for the whole year, but for seven and a half months i.e. from 15 August 1947 to 31 March 1948.
One of the highlights of this first budget was that despite the partition of the country, India and Pakistan agreed to use the same currency until September 1948. Later, after the resignation of R. K. Shanmukham Chetty, John Mathai took over as Finance Minister and presented the 1949-50 budget, which is considered to be the first budget of a fully integrated India.
The first budget of independent India was very small in size. At that time, the total estimated income of the government was Rs. 171.15 crore, while the total expenditure was estimated at Rs. 197.29 crore. Thus, the first budget was a deficit of about Rs 24.59 crore. At that time, the country's security was the biggest challenge, so a large part of the budget was spent on defence. The defence budget was around Rs. 92.74 crore, which was almost half of the total expenditure. Today, when the budget has become lakhs of crores of rupees, these figures of India's first budget clearly show the economic journey of the country.